


ad astra per aspera

by skuls



Series: Half-Light Universe [8]
Category: The X-Files
Genre: Casefiles, F/M, Half-light universe
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-04-08
Updated: 2016-04-22
Packaged: 2018-05-31 22:26:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 11,971
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6489778
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/skuls/pseuds/skuls
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Case file stories from the half-light au.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> i'm writing this rambly story for four reasons. 1. i love the half-light universe an unexpected. unhealthy amount. 2. i love x files and mow and horror movies and case files. 3. i also love mulder and scully and i wanted to explore the specifics of their relationship that i left out in half-light. 4. i am always bored and in need of a project.
> 
> this will be ten case stories. the first 9 take place entirely in the second part of half-light, and along a s1-4 timeline. the tenth takes place early on in part three, on a s5 timeline. the stories coincide with things mentioned in 'half light' and 'five moments mulder and scully shared (and one they didn't)'. it's not necessary to read half-light and five moments before this, but it is recommended, because everything will be freaking confusing if you don't. 
> 
> all this being said, disclaimer: i have very limited travel experience, so my descriptions are probably highly inaccurate. i have no idea how law enforcement investigates, even after watching 208 episodes of txf and 150+ of castle. i have little knowledge of the 90s, as i did not live through them. (they had some awesome tv though.) and i do not own anything affiliated with the x files. this is probably cheesy and corny, and i tried my best to keep it lighthearted and enjoyable, but there is angst, of course. i try not to get too graphic, but since this is case file stories, there will be death, etc. 
> 
> i got the title from "badass latin phrases for tatoos" (http://www.bryndonovan.com/2014/12/12/latin-phrases-for-tattoos/) because latin is badass and i needed a better title than "ten case files", and txf has a habit of using latin phrases for titles (mememto mori, etc.) this one means “through difficulties, to the stars”. (accurate, in terms of msr.)
> 
> EDIT: i got writer's block. now, it's just an unspecified amount of case files from the half-light au.

**one.**

_1993_

_So, even after all that we’ve seen, you still don’t believe in ghosts?_

There’s a lot of unnerving things about being in an airport in 1993 when you’re used to airports in 2016. Mulder scans the array of people. It’s an old habit, years old. He’d sometimes made a game out of looking at people and trying to figure out why they were there. He’d used to try and make Scully join in. She’d never really been very good at it, coming up with answers like, “He’s on a business trip. She’s visiting her parents.” He’d sometimes been able to get a laugh out of her.

He’d looked through people at airports - people everywhere, really, but especially airports - for Samantha. Later, he’d looked for his son.

He spots Scully moving towards him through the crowd of people. She smiles tentatively at him as she comes over to join him. “Hi.”

“Hey, Scully.”

She sits beside him, her eyes moving over the crowd briefly. He wonders if she used to search for her son, too.

“Do you have the file?” she asks.

“Sure.” Mulder pulls it out of the outside pocket on his carry-on and passes it to her.

“Thanks. I wanted to take a look at it before we get up there.”

“Already building your case against me?” he teases.

“Why not? I need to have something prepared for your ghostly claims.”

They're both scanning the crowd at this point. She probably does share his habit of looking for their son, he realizes. He hadn't noticed on the most recent time they'd flown together, the case in Oregon. They'd driven to Philadelphia, and the other two cases had been in DC. The suicide, and the other one. The one where… before they'd come here. The reason they were back.

Their plane is called, and they head towards the boarding gate.

***

She shivers when they exit the corresponding Boston airport. The air is biting, wind blowing harshly. Her windblown hair obscures the right side of her face. She brushes it back as she says, “I didn’t think to bring a jacket. DC isn’t usually this bad this time of year.”

He offers her his jacket (which would undoubtedly swallow her in the brown fabric, sleeves obscuring her small hands with only the fingertips visible, the empty edges blowing in the wind), and she declines it. He figured she would. He has the urge to wrap his arm around her and engulf her, be a shield for the wind, but she wouldn’t agree to that, either, if he had the courage to ask.

He turns the heat up in their rental car, some small shield against the cold. She scrunches up her shoulders and thanks him. They drive along a lonely road.

“So, even after all that we’ve seen, you still don’t believe in ghosts?” Mulder asks her.

Scully shakes her head firmly. “Everything that happened… there… could’ve been a result of the place. Ghosts aren’t necessarily real.”

“I think they are,” he says, somewhat stubbornly. It wasn’t just the desire to believe that his poster proclaimed - it was the ones he’d seen - Samantha, the Gunmen, even goddamn Krycek. He couldn’t dismiss it so quickly.

Scully moves her hands closer to the vent. “I saw you,” she whispers.

He’s confused by this statement. “What?”

“In February, before we… found you.” She won’t look at him. “I saw you, your…”

“Oh.” He grips the wheel a little tighter. She’d rarely discussed that event.

“It wasn’t very eventful. I looked away and you were gone.” She turns to look at him. “You don’t remember?”

He doesn’t remember much of anything about his death in the other place besides that rainy road in Oregon, where he’d been the entire time, anyway. This situation gets harder and harder to deal with. “No,” he says. But it makes sense, though, that he would come to her. She’d been all he had left at that point.

He senses that there is more to her relationship with ghosts that she is not telling him, but he won’t push. He stops at a store and buys her a gray windbreaker. It doesn’t go with her suit, but she shrugs it on anyway, and doesn’t meet his eyes when she thanks him.

***

The house would remind him of the Amityville Horror if it wasn’t out in the middle of nowhere by itself, and he tells Scully as much. “I’ve read the book, Mulder,” she says. “And seen the movie. That was a demon.”

“This could be a demon, you know,” he says.

“Let’s not jump to conclusions, and just check out the crime scene.”

The officer shows them around the taped-off entrance hall. “No signs of anyone entering or exiting the house,” he says. “No one had seen or talked to them in weeks, including their relatives. Coroner estimated about three days of decay.”

“Did the coroner find a cause of death?” Scully asks.

“Says their hearts gave out. But no signs of disease or failure - they were healthy. No signs of trauma to cause that. They just… died.”

Mulder surveys the room. “This crime scene is immaculate.”

“This is exactly how we found it, Agent. We didn’t touch a thing besides the bodies.” The cop fixes him with a steely look.

“Where did you find the bodies?”

“At the door, as if they were trying to fight their way out.” He passes Mulder a file. “Here’s everything we know, although it isn’t much.”

“I’d like to do my own exam,” Scully says, her voice taking on it’s doctor tone.

The man looks them over. Mulder is used to law enforcement resenting them now. No one wants to be told that a murder was committed by ghosts. “That’ll be fine,” he says finally.

***

There really is no evidence in the house. Mulder stays back to examine it himself, but there is nothing to suggest that the couple, the Oswalds, were murdered by anything alive.

He goes through the house, and tries to piece together the lives of this couple. Even after all these years, his profiling training lies fresh in his mind. Their kitchen is a mess, dishes piled in the sink, flies starting to gather. There is a picture on the mantle in their living room of their wedding. They have one bedroom with a queen sized, unmade bed in it, and another one like the shell of a nursery, crib in the corner, rug on the floor, not much else. The woman wasn’t pregnant. Were they trying for a child?

He finds Mr. Oswald’s office. He was a writer, the file says, but the office more closely resembles Mulder’s office from his house in the other place. His desk is overrun with photocopies of old newspaper articles, torn-out pages from books (most of which Mulder recognizes on sight), scribbled and ripped lined papers. He picks one up at random. There is a circled 7.

Mulder sits at the desk, and reads through the array. The purpose of Mr. Oswald’s obsession becomes clear - he was reading up on the history of the house. 7 - there had been seven deaths since it was built in 1815. First, the deaths of the original owners, a family of four, in 1835. It had been a murder-suicide committed by the mother. Then, the death of a six-year-old boy in 1845, whose family had left soon after that. The death of a sickly old man, who’d managed to keep the house for fifty years, who’d died in 1913. The death of an ambitious playwright in 1968. And now this. Seven became nine. Nine deaths in the house.

The newspaper reports hadn’t gone into detail about the deaths - autopsies weren’t as common, then. But Mulder has a sneaking suspicion it has to do with the house. And the murder-suicide of the original owners.

He feels a shiver crawl up the back of his neck. He peers into a mirror hanging on the wall - and sees it. A fading image of the man who is immortalized in the pictures on the wall. He mouths something.

Mulder immediately looks over his shoulder, and sees nothing. An empty space. Like what happened to Scully. He’d once been able to talk to ghosts, but he supposes that ability stayed behind with the other place. He shoves the chair away from the desk and leaves the room.

What had the image mouthed to him? Oh, yeah - _get out._

***

Multiple vengeful spirits is probable not a good sign. Mulder drags a fry through his puddle of ketchup as Scully explains the autopsy results. It’s a good thing they aren’t bloody results. He still gets a little squeamish when she explains them over meals.

“I don’t know what to tell you,” she says with a shrug. “There’s no visible cause of death. They did not have heart attacks - and besides, what are the odds of two healthy people having a heart attack at the same time? They weren’t murdered, as far as I can tell. It’s so improbable, Mulder.”

“I have a theory,” he offers.

She smiles a little. “What is it?”

He relays to her his experience in the house.

She swallows a bite of her salad, and says, “So… what, you think it could’ve been a result of the spirits of the original family who owned the house?”

“You’ve heard the stories of vengeful spirits who want people off of their property,” he offers up. “Remember when we rented _The Conjuring_? You went on and on about how improbable the entire thing was. It's impossible to watch a movie with you.”

She glares a little, leaning in closer. “Mulder,” she says quietly, “not only was that a movie, but it’s a movie that doesn’t _exist_.”

“But it’s a true story, to a point. I read about it. Those same people who investigated the Amityville Horror worked on it. Besides that, there are other examples. It seems like the mostly likely example to me.”

“But most of the time, spirits kill people by possessing them and causing them to do it to themselves,” Scully points out. “In the movies.”

Mulder grins. “Yeah, but that’s the movies, Scully. This is real life.”

She bites back a smile and tries to look annoyed. “It won't look good on paper.”

“Do our reports ever look good on paper?” he teases. Her hand rests at the halfway mark of the gray table, and he resists the urge to slide their fingers together seamlessly.

***

Mulder flips through the lifted notes from the house. It’s clear that Mr. Oswald believed that the deaths in the house were connected to the reported hauntings. Entries claim that he was hearing voices, seeing things. Like what he saw in the mirror. Scully would suggest hallucinogens, poisonous gases in the house, and he would believe her if not for the clear evidence to the contrary.

There is a rap at his door, and Scully is behind it, windbreaker zipped up to her chin. “I think we should go back,” she says.

“To the house?”

“I’ve been thinking, Mulder. Maybe… whatever happened to kill that couple happened at night. I think we should go and stake out the house to see if it happens again.”

“Seems like a shaky plan to me, at best,” he says.

Scully glares. “What, and you have a better idea?”

That he does not. Mulder hands over the car keys and grabs his gun.

***

A thousand stakeouts, and this one feels too familiar. Scully picks up sandwiches, but no iced tea or root beer alike, and Mulder wouldn’t dare make a “could be love” joke this time. Their relationship is one of those things they’ll never discuss, he supposes, right up there with Emily and William.

They watch the house. Scully turns up the heat. The house sits looming and dark before them. Nothing happens.

“Three a.m.,” Mulder says as the clock flicks over. “The demon hour. Maybe something will happen.”

Scully isn’t listening. She leans forward to get a better look at the house. “Is that a light on upstairs?”

“What?”

“It is,” she says, gripping his arm. “Mulder, let’s go take a look.”

“What if it’s dangerous?”

“What if it’s a human killer returned to the house?”

Mulder feels like rolling his eyes, for once. “Of all the unanswered questions in this case, Scully, I think we can both safely say that this is _not_ a human killer.”

“But it’s our job to figure that out.” She tugs at his sleeve. “Come on, Mulder, let’s go check it out.”

Of course he’s going. They amble up the stairs of the dark house, and inside. He thinks idly of a similar house with a Christmas record playing and the floor smeared with their blood, and wonders if he’ll ever stop treating that past like it actually happened.

Scully is already halfway up the staircase, but something prevents him from following her. He stands frozen in the entry hall. Whispers crowd his head incessantly. He can’t make out what they are saying. He tries to call out for her, but she’s already upstairs.

He sees a series of pale face flash before him. The whispers grow louder. It’s like the ringing in his head from the case with the mutated kids, but instead of a shrill piercing sound, it’s soft and unintelligible words. His vision blurs. A startled yelp comes from upstairs. He tries to say her name again, but his vision goes black before he can get it out.

***

“Mulder?”

She has two fistfuls of his t-shirt curled into her hands. They’re just outside the door, him on the ground, her crouched above him. He leans against her. “Scully? What happened?”

“You were possessed. I had to get you out of the house.” Her eyes are wide as she looks down at him.

“Are… are you okay?”

She nods, and drags a finger tip under her eyes. He squeezes her hand to offer some comfort.

***

He's sprawled out in the backseat. Scully insisted he rest, practically shoving him down before covering him with her jacket. The police got here about an hour ago. The siren wails as it pulls away.

Mulder shoves the door open, and goes to Scully, who is staring up at the large mansion. He drapes her jacket over her shoulders, muttering a soft, “Hey.”

“Mulder, you need to be resting.”

“I'm fine, Scully, really. I feel fine.” The wind is blowing her hair wildly. He tucks it back gingerly. “What'd they say?”

She shrugs up at him. “They think we're crazy, but I recommended they destroy the house, make sure nobody buys this property. It's dangerous.”

“Unless you want to attempt an exorcism.”

“Mulder, you're never going into that house again,” she says, gently, but firmly. “The best thing to do is to stay away from it. The former owners are dead, anyway.”

He realizes something suddenly. “Scully, you believe that it's ghosts?”

“Yes.”

“Why… how… how did you figure out I was possessed?”

“I was upstairs, and I saw something.” She hesitates. “Mrs. Oswald. She was mouthing something to me. I was able to make it out… she said something about how the spirits had possessed you. I went downstairs, and found you… all I could think to do was to get you out before you died. I guess they didn't want you once you left the house.”

He smiles a little. “You saved me again, Scully.”

“An apparition saved you, Mulder,” she says, smiling a little herself.

She shivers again, and leans into him. He wraps an arm around her shoulders. They stare up at the house.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i wrote this particular case because i love horror movies, such as the conjuring, as i referenced here, and ghosts. so this was inspired by all those haunted house movies i watched.


	2. Chapter 2

**two.**

_1994_

_You scared the sasquatch away, Scully._

“Snow,” Mulder comments as he parks in the cabin’s driveway. “Unexpected.”

“Inconvenient, too, if we're trapped here,” Scully comments. “What all did Dr. Krydon say to you?”

“That his colleague, Dr. Burnwurst, had been missing for several days after going into the woods to look for the sasquatch.” Mulder looks over at her anxiously, but she doesn’t protest the likelihood of finding Bigfoot out here. All she’s said on the subject is that there are more plausible explanations for the disappearance than Bigfoot. For example, starvation, natural disaster, attack by a _documented_ animal. When Mulder pointed out that Bigfoot attack was still, technically, an animal attack, she’d just rolled her eyes.

“All right,” she says. “Well, let’s go talk to Krydon, I guess. You know him, right?”

“Yep. I went to hear him speak at a convention in 1992. He was familiar with my work. We hit it off.”

Scully smirks a little as they approach the front porch. “You and your connections. Did you talk to him in the other place?”

“No, we never spoke.” Mulder raps his knuckles against the door. “Krydon?” He lets a few seconds pass before knocking and calling out again.

“Mulder,” Scully says, crouched in front of the window. “There aren’t any lights on. It looks empty.”

Mulder twists the doorknob, but it doesn’t budge. “Krydon!” he shouts, knocking again. “Are you in there?”

“Do you think he went out in the woods again?”

“It’s definitely a possibility. I mean, this guy is a Bigfoot fanatic.” Mulder eyes the window, which is partially open. “Scully, could you crawl through the window?”

She looks up at him irritably. “What?”

“Crawl through the window,” he repeats. “So you can let me in. I know I won’t fit.”

Scully sighs loudly, and sheds the rather large coat she is wearing. Under it, she is wearing the windbreaker from their first case back here. She climbs in through the window at an impressive pace, calling out, “Dr. Krydon?” as she goes. A second later, the front door opens. “No sign of him,” she reports.

“Damn.”

“I wouldn’t jump to conclusions, Mulder, he could’ve just stepped out for a bit. We should search the surrounding area before panicking.”

“Good idea,” he says, handing her coat over. “But what then, if we don’t find him? The snow is coming down faster.”

Scully surveys the flurry of snowflakes in front of them as she shrugs on the enormous coat. “I don’t know, Mulder. Hopefully, he didn’t go far.”

***

“It would seem that he did, indeed, go far,” Mulder says after nearly an hour later, exasperation lining his voice. Snow is already coating the ground. They’ve searched the surrounding woods, and yelled for Krydon or Dr. Burnwurst, but no such luck.

“I think we should go back to the cabin and call in a search and rescue team,” Scully says. Snowflakes are caught in the cascade of her hair. “Especially with Dr. Burnwurst still missing. Dogs will be able to search these woods much faster.”

He looks up at the sheet of gray covering the sky. “If we stay here much longer, we may not get out.”

“The most important thing is making sure that the scientists get found,” she says, noble as usual. “Don’t you think?”

Something moves in the woods behind them, something big and brown. Mulder freezes. “Scully,” he mutters. “Don’t move.”

She raises her eyebrow. “What?”

“Don’t _move._ ” He fumbles for the camera he’d tucked into his coat pocket.

“Mulder…” Scully whirls around on her heels. The massive animal in the woods lumbers away before he can get a good look.

He groans. “You scared the sasquatch away, Scully.”

“That was a bear!”

“I didn’t get a good look at it.” The camera tumbles out of his pocket, and he bends over to scoop it up.

“I… Mulder… is that a camera? Are you doing that thing you did on the lizard man case?”

“There’s a large difference here, the biggest one being that this is a mammalian creature instead of a reptilian.” That earns him yet another eye roll. He should keep score. “But, also, Scully, this time I have the use of a camera over a smart phone. Which, those apparently don’t exist. By the way. And were much too complicated, anyway.”

“Mulder, when you say things like that, you sound about a thousand.”

“By 2016-in-Hell standards,” he says stubbornly.

“Mulder.” She crosses her arms. “We’re here to find the scientists, not to go Sasquatch hunting.”

“Yeah, but you’d go with me if we were, wouldn’t you, Scully?”

“Mulder. Not the point. Now, I’m going back to the cabin to call the search and rescue team. You can stay out here and hunt Bigfoot if you want, but I wouldn’t, if you really think that’s the cause of the disappearances.”

Mulder surveys the woods, and then Scully, already heading back to the cabin. Based on experience, he is safer with her, so he follows her back to the cabin.

***

“There’s no phone,” Scully says.

“Really? None?”

“Nope.” She flops down on the couch beside him with a sigh. “No cell service out here, either. And judging by the tempest outside, the roads will be too bad to leave.”

“What do you think? Should we just wait out the night, see if Krydon returns?”

“Right now, I think that’s our best option.”

***

“Sorry about the accommodations,” he says, as she carries the bag she wisely packed into the bedroom. “I’ll be glad to take the couch.” He watches her set the suitcase down on the bed from the living room. The cabin is small and cramped. There won’t be much privacy. He hasn’t lived with her in years, not since before she left. The night they’d spent on the couch together hadn’t been much of a view of domesticity. He’d woken up, offered to make her breakfast, she’d gone to the Bureau to ask for her job back, and they’d fallen into a state of affectionate awkwardness.

“Believe me, I’ve stayed in much worse places with you,” she says, offering him a small grin. “This’ll be fine.”

“And sorry about the phone,” he adds. Ever since the date of her father’s death in the other place passed without the death, he knows she has called to check in every day. Like clockwork, unfailing in its constantness.

The smile crumbles a little. “It’s okay. I’ll be fine.”

They stand together awkwardly in the main space of the cabin. Darkness is already starting to fall outside. Mulder chews his lower lip, and gazes at Scully thoughtfully. What to do now.

“We should go through Krydon and Burnwurst’s papers,” she says suddenly. “Get a handle on what they were up to.”

“Okay…” Krydon’s papers are scattered across the coffee table. Burnwurst’s things are in the bedroom. “I’ll take Krydon, you take Burnwurst?”

“Deal.”

***

Mulder can only decipher from Krydon’s notes that he believes the beast has a habitat somewhere on the mountain. “Hey, Scully?” he calls out.

“Yes?”

“You find anything?”

There’s a pause. And then she answers, “Yeah, come here, Mulder. There’s something I want to show you.”

She’s on the bed, wearing a t-shirt, papers strewn about. There are a couple of blurry photographs that Mulder picks up to study definitively. Scully swats his hand impatiently. “I wanted to show you Dr. Burnwurst’s notes. She seems to be focused on observing and studying this… animal.”

“Oh,” Mulder says, scanning the neat and boxy handwriting. “Yeah.”

“You should bring Krydon’s notes in here so we can compare their research.” Her knees are tucked under the shirt. He knows where she got it from, and would complain of her stretching it out if it wasn’t already large on her.

“Why can’t you come out there?” he says, even though he already knows that he’ll be the one to move.

“Because I’m comfortable in here,” she says, her voice almost a whine. “Come on, Mulder, give a little.”

Which is how he ends up sitting beside her on the bed as they flip through the doctor’s notes. At some point, most of the work has gone to Scully, eyes darting back and forth between two papers. Mulder is leaned back against the pillows, and he has been reading the same paper for the past five minutes. He is very tired, and it doesn’t help that his partner is inches away, sweet smelling and warm.

“Mulder,” she says suddenly. “Mulder, look at this.”

He lets the paper fall onto the bed, eyelids drooping. “Mmm?”

“There’s a considerable difference, from what I can decipher, on the intentions of Krydon and Burnwurst.” Her voice is growing foggy. “Like I mentioned before, Burnwurst shows considerable interests in studying the sasquatch. Of course, the key word here is subtly. She seems to want to keep the study under wraps. And then there’s Krydon, who seems intent on getting proof. Showing people.”

Her voice is almost hypnotic. He turns his head into the pillows, eyes shut. “Uh-huh. Makes sense, Scully.”

“Mulder?” Her hand is on his cheek. “Are you asleep?”

“Mmhmm.” Her touch is soothing, and he leans into it with sleepiness.

***

There is a warm breath against his shoulder, and when he moves his head, he is tickled by hair. They are both still on Scully’s bed when he awakes. Except he is fairly sure there was some more space between them originally, and he was in a more upright position.

He’d fallen asleep first, because he doesn’t remember her falling asleep. Which means that she undoubtedly moved closer to him during the night. If he were still in high school, he would be beside himself with _what does this mean?_ But he doubts that many high school boys have ever been in his unique-type situation.

Not wanting to awaken Scully, he shifts only slightly, and picks up the paper he’d been reading before. It’s one he’d seen earlier, but the words register with him differently this time.

_Habitat on the mountain… maybe a cave… that’s where Krydon is, he’s waiting it out._

“Scully,” Mulder whispers intently. “Hey. _Scully_.”

She makes a soft, indignant sound. “Go ‘way, Mulder,” she mutters through the layers of sleep, nestling closer to him.

He definitely wants to stay here, but he also knows he needs to go and do this now, while he’s still caught up in the moment. “No, Scully, I think I know where Krydon is.”

She groans irritably when he moves out from under her. “Sorry,” he mutters, leaning down and kissing her forehead. “I’ll be back, I promise.” He smooths her hair back before leaving the room quickly.

***

Mulder finds Krydon at the entrance to a cave halfway up the mountain, snow blowing all around him. “Krydon!” he shouts.

The man turns to face him, obviously having been caught off-guard. “Agent Mulder?”

He nods, approaching the man at the mouth of the cave. “What are you doing up here in a snowstorm? My partner and I showed up to search for your colleague.”

“Dr. Burnwurst is dead,” Krydon says after a pause, some slight regret staining his tone.

“She is?” Mulder steps into the cave with some curiosity. Burnwurst’s body lies on the ground, several days of decomposition evident.

“I think the sasquatch got to her,” he says with some small disgust. “She was always getting too close…”

Mulder examines the body more closely, kneeling beside it. There is dried blood matted in the woman’s hair, but no scratch or bite marks anywhere else… He is no coroner, but he knows an animal attack when he sees one. “It wasn’t the sasquatch,” he says. “She was murdered.” He stands, turning to face Krydon. “Blunt force trauma to the head, it looks like…”

He is met with the barrel of a gun in his face. “Don’t move.”

***

Mulder idly wonders if Krydon plans to let him freeze to death. If he does, he’s certainly on his way.

“Why kill Burnwurst?” he asks. “Did it stem from your desire to want to take the credit?”

The man paces the ground erratically before him, keeping his gun pointed in Mulder’s direction. “Well, it’s certainly desirable. But, no. Burnwurst didn’t plan on telling anyone about our find. And to be quite honest, I wasn’t sure how far she was willing to go to keep it a secret.”

Mulder wraps his arms around his knees as he shifts positions. Krydon had taken off his coat to search him for weapons, and he hadn’t bothered to give it back. “So, you feared Burnwurst would kill _you_?”

“Isolation does funny things to a person, Agent Mulder.”

He can tell by the fact that he is being held captive in a cave with no coat by a madman obsessed with Sasquatch. If this were a case he was presenting to Scully, she would’ve been rolling her eyes by the time the first sentence left his mouth. “But why kill me?” he asks. Although Krydon hadn’t expressed a desire to kill him yet. He tries an approach to calm the man. “You know that I wouldn’t object to publicizing the sasquatch. The convention that we met at should let you know that much.”

“Maybe not, Agent Mulder, but you knew that I killed Dr. Burnwurst.” Krydon’s fingers tighten around the gun.

“But I didn’t. Know that you were the one who killed her, I mean. Not until you pointed a gun in my face.”

“You would’ve figured it out. I know you. I’ve followed your career, your work in your division at the FBI. You weren’t supposed to find me. I called you up here in the hopes that you would assume the sasquatch had killed Burnwurst and me. I expected it fully.” Krydon turns to face him, and their eyes meet. His gaze is hard as he asks, “So. Where is your partner?”

His pulse already racing, Mulder says immediately, “Leave her out of this.”

“You said that you were searching for me.”

“I was. I left her asleep in the cabin. She doesn’t know about any of this. Leave her out of it.”

“She won’t come looking for you?”

“She will,” Mulder says honestly. “But she doesn’t have to find me. You can disappear, and she won’t find you.” This is a lie, but a desperate one that he hopes will work.

Krydon narrows his eyes, but for a second, he doesn't say anything, and Mulder is hopeful.

But then her voice is echoing through the woods. “Mulder?”

He freezes, shoves his back against the wall. Quiet. Maybe if he doesn't say anything, Krydon will ignore her.

But then she appears in the door of the cave, coat and boots  thrown on over her pajamas, gun at her side. Krydon turns his attention to her, aiming.

Mulder lifts up and lunges at Krydon. He immediately retaliates, shoving back with force. The gun goes off. They go to the ground as Mulder grabs for it.

The butt of a second gun slams into the back of Krydon’s head, Scully standing above him. He slumps forward in a state of unconsciousness,and Mulder shoves his limp body off of him onto the ground. “Scully, are you okay?” he asks instantly. He's fairly sure the shot went in the other direction, but you can never tell when something like that will ricochet.

“I'm okay.” She grabs his hand, two icy palms meeting, and tugs him to his feet. “You?”

He nods. “You got here just in time.”

“Mulder,” she says, cold fingers brushing his cheek. “Mulder.”

He looks past the body. There it is, then. There is the beast, large and hairy in the forest. He doesn’t move for fear of scaring it. He grabs Scully’s fingers on his cheek.

“Scully,” he whispers. “Scully, you’re not going to write this off as a hallucination brought on by the cold, are you?”

Her eyes never leave the animal, either. “No,” she whispers. “Mulder, I’m not.”


	3. Chapter 3

**three.**

_Well, there’s probably a better explanation for the deaths._

“This is ridiculous, Mulder, and so far past improbable that I don’t know what to say.” Scully shoves her sleeves up and stares up at him with annoyance. He’d refused to tell her what the case was about until they’d gotten off the plane in Washington, but she certainly hadn’t expected _this_.

He shrugs. “I knew you would react this way, Scully.”

“So why did you take the case?”

“Because it’s an X File.”

Scully narrows her eyes. “Oh, explain that to me again. How, exactly, is this an X File?”

“Five elderly people have died in the past two weeks,” he says in the monotone he’s always used to explain cases to her. If they were back at the office, he’d use slides. “Died in a systematic matter, from falling down the stairs. These people are five of the six founders of the town. One founder remains.”

“Right. So how is this an X File? And don’t tell me you think that a poltergeist or whatever is pushing them down the stairs.”

He grins. He must’ve missed the part where she is furious. “No, not poltergeists, although that’s a good theory, Scully. I’m touched. No, the deaths just happen to coincide with a fourth grade classroom who is doing a lesson on town history.”

She sits up straighter in her car seat to stare at him in disbelief. “What?”

“That’s right, Scully. They had the first five victims come in to talk to the class on the day of their deaths. The last founder is going to come in and talk with them tomorrow, and then they’re going to have an assembly to honor the founders. Although, at this point, I think it’s mostly a memorial for the deaths.”

“Mulder.” She crosses her legs and shifts so she can focus all of her tempered irritation on him. “You’re not suggesting that the fourth graders are causing these deaths, are you?”

“That’s exactly what I’m suggesting, Scully, but not in the way that you think. I think those fourth graders are cursed.”

She blinks. She had expected poltergeists before cursed fourth graders. “What?”

“ _Cursed_ ,” he says with more emphasis.

“I heard you, Mulder. I just don’t think I understand. You think that fourth graders are cursed, and therefore, elderly people they’re learning about are dying?”

“It makes sense, Scully.”

“No, Mulder, it doesn’t. What might make sense is if you tell me _Scully, I think that someone was inspired to kill these elderly people because of the fact that a fourth grade classroom is learning about them._ ”

“That wouldn’t be an X File, though.”

He pouts a little as he maneuvers them down the Washington road, and she props her feet up on the dash and plots her revenge. She kind of hates the West Coast.

***

Mulder goes to interview witnesses while Scully conducts autopsies. She finds nothing conclusive. If they were shoved, the murderer was wearing gloves. Unfortunately, for the case she is building against Mulder, there is no evidence.

He comes back, excitement barely tempered. He is practically bouncing. “Little to no witnesses, but all of them insist that no one could’ve entered the houses,” he says. “What’d you find?”

She rolls her eyes. She can’t help not getting excited over the possibility of cursed school children. “One of us is going to be very happy when I deliver these results,” she says. “And one of us… well…”

“What’d you find?”

“There’s no DNA evidence or anything left on the bodies that suggest that someone pushed them,” she says. “No drugs or anything in the system.” She pushes her words out faster so that he can’t interrupt. “But that doesn’t mean that a _person_ didn’t kill them. They could’ve used gloves, theoretically.”

Mulder shrugs. “Theoretically.”

Scully shifts on her feet, waits for him to dive into his usual monologues about the probability of cursed classrooms.

“You ready to go?”

“Where are we going?”

“To the school. I want to question the staff.”

She groans a little. “You don’t still think that’s connected, do you?”

“You said it might be yourself.”

Scully peels off her white coat and goggles, borrowed from the town coroner. They were a size too big, but she can’t afford to be choosy in a town with such a small population. “I said that someone might have been inspired to commit the murders because the fourth graders are learning about the victims. You, however, blamed it on a curse.”

“Either way, I’d say the lead is worth looking into,” he says as he leans up against a metal cart, watching her hair fall loose from it’s ponytail. “Dr. Scully.”

“Well, there’s probably a better explanation for the deaths.” She tosses her plastic gloves into the trash can.

Mulder shrugs again. They exit the too-small morgue, door swinging heavily shut behind them.

***

The principal is a disgruntled female in a suit similar to Scully’s. She fiddles with a mini snow globe on her desk as she talks to them. Scully has already warned Mulder against bringing up curses when they talked to her, but she keeps her foot next to his just in case.

“I admit, it is strange how the deaths are in line by the activities of Ms. Nichols’ classroom, but I don’t see the connection,” she says uncomfortably.

“That’s what we’re here for,” Scully says. “To find out if there is a connection.”

Mulder leans forward a little. “Are there are practices of witchcraft in the area?”

She kicks his foot.

The principal looks surprised. “Not that I know of, Agent.”

Scully tries to steer the conversation into less dangerous waters. “Were there a lot of people present for the lessons?”

“I’m not sure,” the principal says. “For that, you’d have to talk to Ms. Nichols.”

“What do you think about the possibility of curses?” Mulder asks.

Her foot comes down on his.

***

He calls her that night from his hotel room, when she is going over the file, her pen running out of ink, her scrawled script almost vanishing halfway down the page. “I’m just saying, Scully,” he says.

Scully shifts her weight on the bed, tucking the receiver between her ear and shoulder as she clutches the bulk of the case file and the papers slipping out in one hand, and grasps for the pen with the other. “But, Mulder,” she starts. “That makes no sense. How is everyone they learn about who’s still alive not dropping over dead? I mean, the entire thing is so improbable. You know?”

“Yes, but Scully, the possibility is still there.”

When his voice raises in excitement like this, she can almost imagine they are in the same room. She wishes he would come over and pace around her room as he rants, the way he did in Oregon, in the other place. She is still in the habit of wearing one of his shirts to sleep in, the same as she did there. She likes how the smell of him lingers in the fabric.

“The possibility is always there, Mulder. I’m not going to deny that you’ve been right before.” She pauses, smiling a little. “But a cursed fourth grade classroom? Really?”

“Oh, and this is coming from the person who suggested spontaneous human combustion?”

“That was 18 years ago. In Hell.”

“Counts, Scully.”

“It doesn't.”

“I say it does.”

“Besides, Mulder, after 23 years of working with you in Hell, and several months working with you outside of Hell, even I have observed that in a good percent of our cases, some of your theories are correct.”

“I knew I'd convert you eventually.”

She ignores this. “But another contributing factor to my disdain for your theory for this case is that in most of our cases, there was some sort of... entity behind it all. Not fate. Not some unseen force causing deaths.”

“We had that lucky man case.”

A smile pushes the corners of her mouth as she remembers. “Hell. Doesn't count.”

“Besides, there could still be a person who _cast_ the curse.”

Scully sighs. “Fine. I'll play along. Why curse the classroom if you want the founders dead? Why not curse the founders themselves? In fact, how do you know that it _isn’t_ the founders that are cursed? Or something else?”

“Because,” he says simply. “They’ve done this lesson every year, with every fourth grade classroom. There isn’t any particular pattern to it. And the killings are in sync with the lesson. That’s how I know.”

Scully groans a little. “I still don’t see it.”

“That’s okay,” he says generously. “You’ll see tomorrow.”

“See what tomorrow? Mulder, what’s tomorrow?”

“Scully, have you ever gotten the urge to return to elementary school for a day?”

***

They interview the fourth grade teacher the next morning, before class starts. “I must admit, it’s a strange and tragic coincidence, but I don’t see how it could possibly be connected to my lessons,” she says. “The only ones who are here are the students - and maybe the janitor when he comes through cleaning.”

“I understand,” Scully says charitably. She’s at a loss herself for how anything can be connected.

“Ms. Nichols, do you mind if we sit in on your class today?” Mulder asks. She looks at him out of the corner of her eye, but she doesn’t say anything. They’re out of any other leads. She wonders if she can convince him to dump the case and head back to DC.

The young teacher blinks, wide eyed. “No, that should be fine.”

So they sit in the back of the classroom as the fourth graders file in. Scully has almost dismissed the dull ache left by William and Emily. Almost. She tries not to see the faces of her children in every child, and focus.

A skinny kid in a Spiderman shirt approaches them. He tips his head towards Mulder, ignoring Scully. “Who are you?”

“FBI agent,” Mulder replies.

“Who’s she?” He jabs a thumb in Scully’s direction.

“That’s my partner,” he says, a slight defensive edge to his voice. She considers telling him that he does not need to defend her against a fourth grader.

“Do you have the hots for her?”

Scully laughs immediately, which she turns into a cough. Mulder’s face has reddened. “Daniel, get to your seat,” the teacher instructs. The kid gives Mulder a little wave and scrambles to get to his seat. Scully pats his shoulder sympathetically, still giggling under her breath.

The lessons are somewhat mundane, and Scully is starting to remember why her childhood self loathed school. Mulder seems to be in that state of trying, and failing, to pay attention. She crosses her ankles and plots more ways to get revenge.

There is one time, mid-day, when he grabs her arm, and she lets out a loud gasp. Several girls giggle. She looks over at Mulder questioningly.

“Look, Scully,” he whispers under the drone of the teacher’s voice.

Scully follows his finger. “It’s raining.”

“And the teacher was just talking about _rain_.”

“Mulder…”

“Okay, okay, I get it. Note to self: never try to convince Scully of a curse again. She won’t even note evidence right in front of her face.”

“You mean a coincidence?”

“Ms. Nichols says we’re not supposed to talk in class,” a girl informs them seriously.

“And you’re doing it, Anna, so quiet down,” Ms. Nichols instructs her, but she is glaring at the two agents at the back. Scully squirms a little. She really is going to have to get some sort of revenge after this.

***

“What do you think?”

“I think that school is more terrible than I remembered. What do you think they put in the milk cartons here?” He lifts the small carton up so that she can see it.

“No, Mulder, about the deaths.”

He sets the carton down, and says seriously, “I think that there’s one more thing we need to do, and then I’ll drop this curse thing.”

“And then?”

“It’s up to you. We can leave. We can stay and take a different approach.”

“Okay,” Scully says, dodging the janitor - Wendell, according to his name tag. “And what’s that?”

“Well, the last remaining founder, Ron Wilkinson, is about to address the class. They’ll have the ceremony tonight, and, according to the MO, that’s when the deaths should occur. So we keep an eye on Mr. Wilkinson, quietly. Maybe we’ll catch the killer, maybe we won’t. If the death happens, regardless of what we do, then we’ll know I was right. And if not, you can have your little ‘I-told-you-so’ moment, and it’ll be done.”

“Okay.”

“Scully, that’s the easiest you’ve agreed to something on this case!”

“Don’t flatter yourself. I’m ready for this case to be over with.”

Mulder grins and rubs her shoulder soothingly. “I know. Tell you what, you can pick the next case, okay?”

“I’ll hold you to that, trust me.” They reenter the classroom and slink to the back of the room. Mr. Wilkinson is already at the front. He has a mournful look on his face as he removes his spectacles and rubs his nose.

“I’m sorry about your friends,” says the girl who told them not to talk in class.

The man smiles sadly. “I am, too.” He turns to face Ms. Nichols. “Should we go ahead and get started?”

***

They approach him after the bell rings and the class troops out. “Mr. Wilkinson?” Mulder asks, extending his hand politely. “I’m Agent Mulder, and this is my partner, Agent Scully.”

They exchange handshakes. “We’re in town to investigate the deaths,” Scully explains.

“They’re saying that there’s no evidence of foul play, but it was a murder,” the man says firmly. “I’m telling you.”

“Well…” Scully starts. She’s had her own doubts, but Mulder is right, the pattern is too unusual to be a coincidence. “There’s definitely more here than meets the eye, sir.”

“And we’d like to protect you tonight, sir,” Mulder adds. “At the assembly, and then at your home, if you’ll let us.”

“I appreciate the sentiment, but won’t the killer know that you’re here?”

 _Don’t look at me,_ she thinks to herself, _this was all his idea._

“Our hope is no, sir. We’d be backstage at the assembly tonight. This is mainly a precaution to keep you safe.”

Mr. Wilkinson nods, wipes his glasses on his shirt. “If you think this will help you catch the bastard who’s been doing this, I’m all for it. Do what you need to do.”

***

The rain has escalated into a storm by nightfall. Scully stands out of sight behind the elaborate red curtains. Onstage, the principal is talking about honoring memories. She reaches under her jacket and touches the top of her gun with one finger. She reminds herself that, ridiculous theory or not, this is still a case, and she still needs to be on alert.

The lights in the auditorium flicker, and flare out. Screams arise from the auditorium in a panic. Scully plunges forward, grasping for her gun. “Mulder?” she calls out frantically. “Mulder?”

A hand clamps down on her wrist. “I’m here.”

She reaches out to find him in the dark. “What happened?”

“I’m not sure, but Mr. Wilkinson hadn’t returned from the bathroom yet.”

A shout echoes. They plunge forward in the dark, coming to a stairway. The lights in the hallway at the bottom black out the face, but they can tell that it is Mr. Wilkinson, a hand in the center of his chest, shoving him backwards. “FBI!” Scully shouts, aiming her gun. “Put your hands in the air!”

Mulder lunges, grabbing onto Mr. Wilkinson’s shirtfront. Gravity propels him forward. Still gripping her gun in one hand, Scully reaches out and yanks back on Mulder’s shirt. “Are you okay, Mr. Wilkinson?” she asks, stepping forward to detain the perpetrator. She sees his face as she slaps the handcuffs on - it’s the janitor she almost ran into earlier, Wendell Young.

The man nods, breathing hard. People are already starting to enter backstage. Mulder ducks his head as if he is embarrassed. His face is growing red.

***

“The police have confirmed that Wendell Young grew fixated on the victims when he heard the kids learning about them, and he went to their homes and waited for an opportunity to shove them down the stairs. He was good at what he did, which is why the police couldn't catch him,” she explains to him. He’s barely said anything since they left the school.

He holds up a hand. “I know what you're going to say, Scully.”

“And what's that?”

“You're going to say, ‘I knew there was a better explanation for the deaths’.”

She tips her head. She can feel the beginnings of a smile rising. “Well, I did.”

“And you're going to say ‘there's no way a fourth grade classroom could cause five deaths’. You're going to say, ‘Skinner’s going to be extremely pissed, we may be reprimanded again’. You're going to say, ‘Mulder, you're an idiot…’”

He is an idiot. Scully kisses him before he can continue. She pulls him forward as she rocks back on her heels. His fingers entangle briefly in her hair before she pulls away, gasping. Behind them, someone is laughing wildly. She blushes. What had she been thinking?

“Scully?” His hand is still in her hair.

She pulls away, muttering, “Shut up, Mulder.”

The lights are reflecting in his eyes, and she really is going to have to get revenge on him, but revenge for what, this time? For making her want to kiss him, with his sheepish embarrassment over chasing the idea of a curse? He’s saying something about going back to the hotel, and all she can do is follow him bonelessly. When was the last time she kissed him? Sometime in the other place? Does that even count? No, according to them, it does not count. She is already thinking up excuses she can offer up to Mulder in the car.

One more siren wails in the background. Case closed.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so yes, i decided to kind of discontinue this, but since the stories were kind of singular, it still works to keep them posted. and there may or may not be more in the future. but i've decided to bring about this one because it was already written and i enjoy it. it's corny as hell and includes married mulder and scully. it also lines up with the case when mulder and scully were suspended in pt 2 of half-light. anyways. hope you enjoy, and sorry for the change!

**four.**

_ 1997 _

_ I honestly don’t know anymore. Maybe he’s a werewolf, maybe he’s not.  _

One bad thing about your entire building knowing that a pair of federal agents lives in the apartment building is that you occasionally have a knock on your door at 2:03 in the morning. Scully ends up answering it because Mulder isn’t even awake yet. She blinks blearily at the person on her doorstep. “Can I help you?”

“Your husband is an FBI agent, right?” the woman at the threshold says. Scully searches for the woman’s name in her mind, but she can’t figure it out. If it were any other time of day, she would correct the woman about her own status in an annoyed voice, and probably not even bother getting Mulder in the first place.

But it’s not any other time of day. “Mulder!” she calls out grouchily, and walks away from the door into the kitchen.

He exits the bedroom with sleep tousled hair and a yawn. “What’s going on?”

“You’re an FBI agent, right?” asks the woman. Sandy something, that’s her name. Scully grabs a glass from the cabinet and begins concocting a plot to get a really noisy dog and some earplugs for revenge on this woman. 

One thing she didn’t foresee - but probably should have - is Mulder’s constant defense of her. “Yes,  _ my wife _ and I are federal agents. Now, what’s going on?”

Scully makes a low growling sound in her throat. They couldn’t have moved into  _ her _ building, where she never got people knocking on her door in the middle of the night… well, except for that one time with the dead cat. In Hell. Which they'd always said didn't count, until she said yes to his impromptu proposal by affirming that Hell counted. 

“Oh,” Sandy something says with some surprise. “Well, you two had better come check this out, then.”

Scully slams her glass down, and storms back into the living room. “Check what out?”

“We were having a small get together, but one of my friends is missing now,” Sandy something says. “Sherri Kinset… her husband isn’t worried at all, but I am.”

Scully rubs her eyes. “Was there drinking at the party?”

“Well, of course.”

“How do you know she didn’t just leave, and nobody noticed?”

“Come on, Scully,” Mulder mutters, tugging at her pajama sleeve. “Let’s go check it out.”

“Mulder…” she protests quietly.

“Have a heart, Scully. It won’t take long.”

“What kind of a name is ‘Scully’?” Sandy something remarks from out in the hall. 

“My last name,” she snaps. Sleep deprivation is never good for her. Tomorrow will not be fun.

“You call each other by your last names? Wait, I thought you were married. Don’t you have the same last name?”

Scully ignores the woman, going and getting her gun. As soon as Sandy something sees this, she shuts up. 

***

The party guests stare at them like they are some rare species. People don’t usually expect to see the Feds in pajamas with sleep mussed hair. Mulder yawns and fumbles when he goes for his badge, apparently in his pants pocket. She didn’t know he slept with it. 

“I told you not to get the Feds,” growls a man in the corner, slouched in an easy chair. He crosses his arms and glares at Sandy something.

“But Sherri is missing, Hal! Are you just going to sit there and do nothing?”

“She probably went home,” the man, Hal, says. “Or snuck off to her mother’s. She’s been known to do that.”

“In the middle of a party?” Sandy retorts.

“Wait a second,” Mulder says. He holds up a hand, probably to signal that they should be quiet, but it is the hand holding his badge. Hal rolls his eyes. “Are you Sherri’s husband?”

“Yeah.”

“And you’re not worried?”

“I just told you. She probably went home, or to visit her mother. We’re not the closest of couples. We’re not clingy, like you and your wife.”

Scully blinks widely at this. “Clingy?” Mulder repeats.

“That is your wife, right? Why bring her to a crime scene? Which this is not, by the way.”

Scully glares at the man. “She’s also my  _ partner _ ,” Mulder puts in, his tone hard. “And a very skilled agent.”

“Oh.” Hal looks them over. “You should carry a badge.”

“I do carry a badge,” Scully says angrily. “Just not at two in the morning. Now, since I did come out here, I’m going to go check the apartment.” She pushes past several half-drunk party guests and heads for the back rooms. She finds a woman asleep on the bed, but this particular woman is even less happy to be awake than Scully herself, and proclaims herself not to be Sherri Kinset irritably before slamming the door in her face. 

When she gets back to the living room, Mulder is trying unsuccessfully to question a disgruntled Hal Kinset. “For the last time, I don’t think there’s any cause to be worried,” he snaps. He turns away, muttering, “I told Sherri it was a bad idea to come out on the night of a full moon, but did she listen?”

Mulder raises an eyebrow in interest. Scully is already tugging at his sleeve, saying, “Mulder, if there’s really no reason to be suspicious, then maybe we should go on.” He nods in agreement and follows her out into the hall. 

Back in their apartment, Scully slams their front door, and any hint of light disappears from their apartment. She is already halfway back to sleep. “I wonder why Hal Kinset didn’t want to go out on the night of a full moon,” Mulder says thoughtfully from behind her.

“Who knows,” she mutters from this fog induced by sleepiness. “Maybe he’s the superstitious type. Or-” She snorts as she crawls in between the sheets. “Maybe he’s a werewolf.”

She’d meant it as a joke, but she can already feel the clockwork of his mind turning as he climbs in beside her. She nestles against him in an attempt to make him forget, at least until morning.

***

He is already awake when she gets up, an hour or two too late. “Mulder,” she protests as she pads out of the bedroom. “Why didn’t you wake me up?”

He’s already on the computer, reading almost frantically, wire rimmed glasses falling off of his nose. “I’m the boss of the X Files, remember, Scully? I make the hours. And besides, I’m already working.”

“What’re you-” She groans as she sees what he has pulled up. Articles on werewolves. “Mulder, you didn’t take me seriously, did you?” 

“What if Hal Kinset wasn’t able to control his transformation and he ate his wife?”

“ _ That’s _ your leading theory?”

“Don’t you find it just a teeny bit suspicious that he wasn’t even a little concerned about his wife?”

“Don’t you think the other guests would’ve noticed if he wolfed up and ate his wife?” she counters.

“You were the one who pointed out that the people may have been drunk enough not to notice Sherri leaving.”

“I think there’s a notable difference between someone walking out the door and someone turning into a wolf!”

Mulder shrugs, turning back to the computer. “Whatever your skeptical mind may come up with, Scully, it is a case. And you know things have been slow lately.”

“Yeah,” she says, reaching a hand out to brush the back of his shoulder, her voice lengthy and teasing. “I thought you’d… enjoy that. Having some time alone in the office.” 

He nods absently as if dismissing her. Scully sighs. “Well, I don’t know about you, but I’m going into the office today.”

“Okay,” he says. “Today will be mostly devoted to research. Tonight, I’m going to stake out the Kinset residence.”

“Mulder,” she groans.

“He’ll transform at night, Scully. Best time.”

She sighs again, heavily, and wishes she’d had the good sense not to make a werewolf joke.

***

Hal Kinset lives in a neighborhood like the one Scully had been imagining in the back of her mind when she asked Mulder if he ever wanted to get out of the damn car and live something approaching a normal life. They are caught somewhere between then and there, she supposes - they will go home together and sleep in the same bed and wear each other’s rings, but they’re spending a Friday night at a stakeout. 

“Full moon,” Mulder says teasingly, the light of it glinting off of his eyes. His sunflower seeds litter the floor of the car, and he has his feet up on the dash. Scully works on an expense report propped up against the steering wheel. Tomorrow, she will definitely let him come alone, there’s no danger here. She tells herself that even though she knows she won’t, because one time she lets her guard down, and everything could go to hell again… literally _ or _ figuratively. Which is about the only damn reason she’s staking out a potential werewolf. 

“I should’ve brought some root beer,” she says lightly, and flicks her eyes upwards to see if he got the reference. He is grinning in that goofy way he has, which is a yes in her book, and she sits up straighter in her seat, because if she closes her eyes she can almost imagine them as teenagers up at some lookout, damn stakeout or no, and she leans closer, practically scaling the console.

“Scully!” he hisses, attention shifted. “Look!”

She freezes, one knee braced against the console, arms wrapped around his neck. “What?”

“Look!” He points again and she follows it. A dog-like figure darts across Kinset’s lawn into the woods at the back. “Do you think it’s him?”

“Mulder…” she starts, but he’s already pulling away and darting into the lawn. “Mulder!” she hisses, their cover already blown. She considers not following him only for half a second, because what if that really is a werewolf, so she runs after him across the dew-sprinkled grass.

She catches up to him on the edge of the foliage, and he holds a finger to his lips before entering the woods, gun in hand. They only go a few steps before a flashlight is turned towards them, briefly blinding. 

“What the hell are you doing here?” says Kinset from somewhere behind the flashlight. Scully fumbles for her badge, nearly dropping it. “Oh,” the man responds in a sour tone.

_ Well, now you know I have a badge,  _ she thinks irritably.

***

Skinner is pretty grouchy at being called out in the middle of the night as well. Scully wonders idly if he's ever showed up at a crime scene in his pajamas, and then for some reason, can't stop picturing him lecturing them from beneath a nightcap, Scrooge style. 

“What the hell were you two thinking?” he growls. “You have no foundation to pursue Mr. Kinset for his wife's disappearance… hell, it's not even a disappearance! Mr. Kinset hasn't called the police. You have no reason to be investigating this.”

“Our neighbor, Sandy Kendall, reported it,” Mulder relays.

Sandy Kendall, that was her name. Scully has a sudden realization that Mulder referred to her as “ _ our _ neighbor”, and feels a sudden wave of panic and irritation, but Skinner doesn't comment. Instead, he just says, “According to eyewitnesses, Miss Kendall, as well as most of the people at that party, were heavily intoxicated at the time.”

“Still, sir. Don't you find it a little suspicious that Kinset doesn't even seem concerned?” Mulder counters.

“That's not your concern, Agent. Even if there is a case here, you two are off of it. Stay away from Hal Kinset. That's an order.”

“Yes, sir,” Scully cuts in before Mulder can speak. 

Skinner shakes his head and starts away. A small spark of curiosity seems to drive him back. “I just don't understand your interest in this case,” he says. “It's not an X File.”

It has been some time since Scully's days of devout prayer, but at the moment, she is praying that Mulder won't let Skinner in on his theory.

“Well, sir, I believe there is a possibility of Hal Kinset being a werewolf.”

Skinner stares at them incredulously for a moment before shaking his head again and repeating, “Stay away from Hal Kinset.” Then he walks away, jaw very visibly clenched.

Mulder turns to her, mind already working to find a loophole. “What do you think?”

“I don't. Skinner says we're off the case.” Scully is already headed to the car.

“This all seems a little  _ Rear Window _ -ish to me,” he affirms as he climbs into the passenger seat.

She slams the door and starts the car. “Except  _ Rear Window _ actually had some plausible evidence in it. Like most of our cases do. Except this one - it's the worst case we've ever worked.”

“Why are you so hostile towards this case, Scully?”

She hits the gas, and he presses his hand against the dash for support. “Because that man is not a werewolf, Mulder! Out of all the cases we've worked, Hell or no Hell, this is the craziest and most ungrounded idea you've ever had.”

“What about the cursed fourth graders?”

“That one at least had some slight traction. There isn't even a case here, Mulder. We don't know  _ where  _ Sherri Kinset is, but we have no grounds to stake out her husband.”

Mulder sighs a little. He picks up the discarded sunflower seed bag and clips it shut. “Tell me you don't find it suspicious, Scully.”

She stomps on the brake to stop at a red light. “Fine, yes. It would be nice to have some confirmation of Mrs. Kinset’s whereabouts. But based on the circumstances of the disappearances, I would like to know more about what happened out at that party before I put all the blame on Mr. Kinset.”

“Come with me to talk to Sandy Kendall.”

“Mulder, we're off the case.”

He rubs her shoulder briefly. “Come on, Scully. We could be saving a woman's life.”

“Not necessarily.” Scully sighs. “I don't like that woman.”

“I don't like her, either, but look at it this way. She may confirm one of your theories.”

She sighs again, and fights the smile pulling at her lips. “Well, what're we waiting for, then?”

***

Scully isn’t quite convinced that the real villain in this story isn’t Sandy something/Kendall herself, for dragging them into this story that they don’t belong in. She seems considerably less enthusiastic to see them. “I don’t want to talk to the FBI.”

“Will you talk to your neighbors?” Mulder counters.

“I don’t know what you want from me. I thought there was nothing suspicious about Sherri’s disappearance,” the woman says grouchily. She leaves the door open as she stalks over to her dining room table.

“Still. Do you remember anything from that night that you didn’t tell us before?”

“No.”

There is another woman sitting on the couch, the one who'd slammed the bedroom door in Scully's face the night before. “I remember something,” she offers. 

“Can you tell us?” Mulder asks. 

“Who wants to know?”

“FBI,” Scully says, flashing her badge.

The woman nods in acknowledgment. “I hate these parties,” she says by way of beginning. “I've always hated them. I was hiding out in Sandy’s bedroom until it was over with. I was trying to sleep when I heard Hal in the next room over.”

“Doing what?” Scully asks. 

“Um, I'm not sure. He was groaning. Not the good kind, either, the kind that sounds painful.”

“Holly,” Sandy says irritably, swallowing an aspirin. 

“And then I heard Sherri go in there. She was barking mad at him, saying _not here, not here_ ,” Holly continues. “And then Hal was saying something about _it’s your…_ something or other. And then all I could hear was moaning… and some growling, I think. I assumed they were having sex.”

Sandy coughs. Mulder snorts. Scully clears her throat. “And do you remember anything else? Seeing Sherri again?”

“No, because I didn’t want to listen to them have sex. I put in my earplugs and went to sleep. And then the next thing I knew, I was being woken up by you, Agent Mulder.”

“But I didn’t…”

“It’s Agent  _ Scully _ .”

“Really? I thought you two were married.”

Mulder waves a hand in dismissal. “You know what, forget the marriage thing. Thank you, Holly. You’ve been very helpful.” 

“No problem, Agent… are you Agent Scully, also?”

“We don’t share a last name,” Scully says irritably. “Thank you to both of you, and next time you lose someone, please go to the FBI agents across the hall.” She tugs Mulder out of the apartment.

“Scully, there aren’t FBI agents across the hall.”

“Yeah, well, I’ve never liked the Kebricks, so they can wake _ them _ up next time.”

Mulder leans against the wall as he watches her search for the key. “What do you think?”

“I…” She sighs. “I don’t _ know _ . I honestly don’t know anymore. Maybe he’s a werewolf, maybe he’s not. Either way, he could be a murderer.”

“He may not have known what he was doing. He may not have been able to control it.” Mulder sighs. “But I think we need to find out for sure. Law enforcement may pursue Hal Kinset, but they won’t pursue him as a werewolf, and that could make this situation more messy.”

Scully sighs, too. “I hate to admit it, but I think you’re right.”

“Those are my favorite words to hear.” He grins a little. “But how are we gonna catch him? Skinner told us to stay away.”

Scully pictures the lightbulb popping over the cartoon character’s head, and knows very well that she is going to regret this. “I have an idea.”

***

“I don’t like this idea,” he’d said about a million times, the most recent pouting at her from the driver’s seat. She’d reassured him every time, told him that it didn’t make sense for him to go and feign apology, since it’d been his idea to conduct an unethical stakeout on Hal Kinset. But it made sense for her to do it. She had a gun under her jacket, and he’d be waiting outside in the car. She’d kissed him quickly and told him not to panic, even though she instinctively knew two things: that he would, and that she would, too, in his position. 

She taps on the door with two knuckles. “Mr. Kinset?” she calls out. “It’s Agent Scully. I wanted to apologize for the other night.”

After a minute of stinted waiting, she taps the door harder, calling out, “Mr. Kinset?” again. The door swings open, creaking eerily. The house is dark. Scully steps inside, one hand creeping inside her jacket to touch her gun. Mulder watches anxiously from the car. 

The house is small, and squatty. The living room and kitchen are visibly empty. Curtains are drawn closed on almost every window, but one pairs gapes open, and moonlight streams in through the crack. She moves towards the back of the house, into a bedroom. The bed is unmade, rumpled. There is a ripped t-shirt on the floor.

A floorboard creaks. “Scully?” Then a snarl. 

She tears into the living room to find him facing down a canine-like creature. Dog, coyote, wolf, Scully can’t tell in the dark. “Mulder!” She plows into him from the side and knocks him to the floor. The animal lunges, and he throws up an arm. The animal paws at them and snaps the air. Scully pulls Mulder back into a corner of the room. They are cornered.

A overhead light comes on. “What the hell?” A woman drags the animal away by the skin of the back of his neck. “Who are you? What are you doing in my house?”

They both fumble for their badges, stammering out, “FBI” in cadence.

The woman shoves the dog into the back room and slams the door, eyeing them suspiciously. “You wouldn’t happen to be Sherri Kinset,” Mulder says in defeat. “Would you.”

***

Every time they get called into Skinner’s office, Scully feels like a kid at the principal’s office. She resists the urge to kick his desk. 

He’s already lectured them about the meaning of following a direct order, and the possibility of being sued by the Kinsets for two violations of their constitutional rights, when he says, “I’m putting you two on mandatory leave, effective immediately.” She isn’t surprised.

“But, sir…” Mulder starts an argument he won’t win.

“This is not a matter up for debate, agents.” His cool exterior is betrayed when his neck turns red with embarrassment, and he looks down at his desk. “It’s about time you two took a honeymoon, anyway.”

A cool wave of surprise falls over Scully. She’d always insisted that Skinner saw through their charade, but she hadn’t really expected it. “Sir?” she gasps out. 

“Hand over your badges and guns and get out of my sight.”

They slide them across the desk, and shove out of the office in a hurry. “I told you so,” Scully hisses through clenched teeth, as soon as they are out of earshot of the receptionist.

Mulder grins and tugs on a strand of her hair. “Skinner could always see through us. Hey, how about we take his advice?”

She snorts. “A honeymoon?”

“Sure, why not? We could go to West Virginia, Point Pleasant to be exact.”

“Point Pleasant…?”

He’s on a roll, barreling forward like a freight train. “Very nice this time of year, and hey, maybe we can finally find that mothman, go out into the woods with sleeping bags.”

“Mulder?”

“Yeah?”

“Shut up.”

“Okay. Scully?”

“Yeah?”

“I was right about the werewolf.”

“No, Mulder, I don’t think you can claim this one. That could’ve been their dog.”

“C’mon, Scully.”

“I think I was right. We really don’t know if it was a werewolf or not.”

“If I agree that you were right, can we go to Point Pleasant?”

“Mulder… you know, what, sure. If you agree, we can go to Point Pleasant.”

“Okay, then, you were right.” 


End file.
